Joseph Bucci Facing Jail Time After Spending $70,000 That Wells Fargo Mistakenly Put In His Account

05/23/2012 05:25 pm ET
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Updated
May 24, 2012

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One man is facing possible jail time after he allegedly spent tens of thousands of dollars that Wells Fargo accidentally deposited into his account.

Joseph Bucci woke up one day to find $70,000 in his Wells Fargo bank account, which previously had about $35 dollars, Phillyburbs.com reports. Police allege Bucci knew the money wasn’t his, but went on a monthlong spending spree anyway; now, he’s facing felony charges and seven to 14 years in jail.

An internal Wells Fargo investigation found that a teller at one of the bank’s branches accidentally typed Bucci’s account number, depositing $69,300 in checks in March that was intended for another account, according to Phillyburbs.com.

So what exactly did Bucci buy with all of that magic money? A four-month old golden retriever, a trip to Florida and a used car among other things, CBS News reports.

"I knew it was going to catch up to me… just didn’t know it was going to be this bad," Bucci told CBS.

Bucci isn’t the first customer to wake up to a surprise boost to a bank account balance. New Zealand resident Kara Hurring was found guilty of fraud, theft and money laundering earlier this month after she transferred millions of New Zealand dollars accidentally deposited into her partner’s account into other accounts before moving to China. Dubbed the "accidental millionaire," Hurring is set to be sentenced in August.

One savvy German man, known as "Michael H" was actually able to benefit from money that his bank mistakenly put in his account and unlike Hurring and Bucci, he isn’t facing criminal charges. After Comdirect accidentally dumped 200 million euros into his account, Michael moved some of the money into his account at a different bank, according to British personal finance site Thisismoney.co.uk. Though Comdirect withdrew the erroneous deposit, a court ruled that the man can keep the 12,000 euros in interest that he earned while the cash was sitting in his account.